Xiangye Lijing Hotel Beijing

... at the gates and hadn't asked them to do that. So with the tighter turn around and not needing to change planes, I was able to reach my flight to Beijing in time. The Kathmandu departure process is totally ridiculous. And I'm sorry, Chinese people are really pushy. They have no respect for a cue and almost have this cultural sense of entitlement - purely probably as a survival thing of living with a billion people - that if they just all swarm something (a gate, a line, a ...

... apprehension regarding the whole undertaking. For the two of them it was just a common street crossing which most likely evaporated from their memory the moment they stepped on the pavement on the opposite side of the street. For me it was a life-risking adventure. And on the road itself none of the drivers displayed a single sign of jitters. Fantastic.
Xinjiekou Beidajie was, as I could see very soon, a street of music shops. A shop upon a music shop, they lined either side of the ...

... un autre monument plus gros au fond. Bon, OK, c'est grand, surtout avec les deux 'petits' sur les cotes. La place suivante est encore plus grande, et le troisieme monument encore plus enorme. Encore deux de chaque, et on apprend qu'on a atteint les limites de la cite exterieure, et que la meme chose attends dans la cite interieure! L'apres midi, on s'est balade loin des attractions principales, la foule s'est eclaircie, et on a plus profite du charme du lieu. On a ...

... more panaramic views. It was a long, steep, grueling hike up the stairs and I passed through three watch towers along the way. It is exciting to know that I was now experiencing another of the New Seven Wonders of the World. The history of the Great Wall is said to start from the Spring and Autumn Periods when seven powerful states ...

... the loadspeaker came on announcing that China was entering a mourning period, flags would be at half mast, and all ships, trucks, ect would sound their horns before entering a moment of silence. Then music, a classical peice, comes on playing throughout the airport. Imagine a giant international airport, full of people, coming to an absolute standstill, complete silence, everyone is standing in place, some people are crying, I almost was it was so overwhelming. In some ways I ...

... anything London buiolds for the 2012 olympics. * Summer Palace- this is an hours bus ride away but for 30p you cant go wrong, although finding where to get the bus is more confusing than first imagined. When you arrive at Sumemr Palace though it is beautiful, it is set on a lake and the views are amazing, even on a dull wet day like yesterday when we went. Our pictures wont do it justice. There is so much to do there you ...

... are looking and sighing and comforting. There's major damage I hadn't noticed. An injury which could rule her out of lots of activities for a long time: that's right, she's damaged the fingernail on one of her manicured and painted fingernails. Now, you might think this is being a little harsh of some 20-something kids who have been forced to do sport. But here's something even weirder: what they think of us. Even though many Chinese would describe most foreigners as 'strong ...

... snakes, sea horses etc. etc. etc. We finally decided on a restaurant, and were shown into a private room, where they'd close the door and knock every time they wanted to come in! :P We ended up ordering double the amount of food we needed! They couldn't fit it all on the table, and we didn't eat even half of it! But when the bill came (and we were v worried about how much it would cost) it turned out to be 50 yuan per person, which is like £3.50 ...

... for more discussion, we went to Yuen2 Ming2 Yuen2 instead. YMY is the place where Chi2 Xi1 Tai4 Hou4 spent our Qing Dynasty's limited national reserve fund which was reserved for building a modern Navy for our norther marine territories for her own garden. Err... Just the thought ****** me off.... What's left now is only a corner of the original garden. The rest of it was destroyed by those 8 countries ...

Beijing Up at 6.30am after just a few winks of sleep for trip to Jingshan or somewhere for a walk along the great wall. Got on the bus at 7am and after a couple of stops at a few other hostels to pick up some others, a familiar (ish) face got on the bus. I heard Bethan (Irkutsk and Terelj National Park) mutter something derogatory about bumping into me again. I think she was joking. Not sure though. Three hours on the bus sat next to a snoring Matteus was followed by a 12km walk ...